War production

“ The authorities responsible for war production will inevitably concern themselves with specific commodities of strategic importance which are likely to become difficult to procure in time of war, either through a rise in total demand or because of enemy domination over important sources of supply. ”

“ And I rather hope that all these figures which I have given will become common knowledge in Germany and Japan.
Our task is hard--our task is unprecedented--and the time is short. We must strain every existing armament-producing facility to the utmost. We must convert every available plant and tool to war production. That goes all the way from the greatest plants to the smallest--from the huge automobile industry to the village machine shop.
Production for war is based on men and women--the human hands and brains which collectively we call Labor. Our workers stand ready to work long hours ”

“ If our history of the war economy had aimed at perfection, it would have included in each chronological Part a long chapter explaining carefully how the war production sector was built up. But the positive employment of resources in the field of war industry is an immense subject. ”

“ The brief post-war orgy of production had run its artificial course. The industrial war babies had died of inanition. Exchange that fluttered like a wounded bird killed international trade. Europe was steeped in poverty. The waste of war could not be repaired until the wrangles of peace subsided. ”

“ In the coming year we must increase the output of many weapons and supplies on short notice. Otherwise we shall not keep our production abreast of the swiftly changing needs of war. At the same time it will be necessary to draw progressively many men now engaged in war production to serve with the armed forces, and their places in war production must be filled promptly. These developments will require the addition of hundreds of thousands to those already working in war industry. ”

“ The volumes which are now nearing completion will deal with the supply and control of raw materials, with the supply and utilisation of labour in the munitions industry, with the provision of factories, plant and machine tools, with the administrative machinery of the supply departments, with the finance of war production and with overseas supplies. There may also be a composite volume dealing with the design and development of weapons. It was also part of the original plan to introduce the series by a ‘synoptic’ volume covering the entire field of war production. ”

“ The number of workers in these branches was increased by only 30 percent. This success was not brought about through a greater exploitation of labor but rather through the abolition of obsolete methods of production and through an improved system of controlling the production of armament.
DR. FLÄCHSNER: What was meant by the concept “war production”—“Kriegsproduktion”?
SPEER: The concept which is frequently used here, “war production,” is nothing else but the ordinary concept, production. It comprises everything which is manufactured industrially or by artisans, including the civilian needs. ”

“ The manufacture of all these and many other accessories had to be instituted and rushed forward and, because of the shortage in skilled labor and the need for it in so many kinds of war production at the same time, workers had frequently to be trained for the making of them. At the end of hostilities between three and four hundred manufacturing concerns, employing over 200,000 skilled workers, were supplying the various needs of this highly specialized branch of warfare. ”

“ I allude only to the decrease in raw materials for the production of munitions, to the thoroughly exhausted human material, and, above all, to the dull despair that pervades all classes owing to under-nourishment and renders impossible any further endurance of the sufferings from the war. ”

“ It was not until the Government of Britain, representing the Community, invited Capital, Management, and Labor to meet in common, and policies were arrived at as the result of Round Table Conference, that the necessary adjustments of industry were so arranged as to make possible the vast production of munitions required to win the War. What was necessary to the winning of the War is equally necessary to the winning of Peace — which we can hardly say exists so long as international strife gives way only to industrial unrest. ”

“ Of course it is difficult for those who are not accustomed to give close attention to the problems of production to appreciate how deeply a world war of four years' duration affects every industry; and especially so when on one side the war was waged on the principle of destroying everything that could be got at, whether it was military or civil property, whether it was an enemy or a neutral possession. ”

“ Remember also that training outruns production in a great war, that 5,000,000 men can be raised and trained before they can be equipped unless we with proper foresight build up our essential industries, keep up our reserve of supplies, and above all, keep such perfect plans that we can turn all the wheels of peace into the wings of war on a moment’s notice. ”

“ Today thousands of England's industrial plants are being operated as government factories for the production of war materials, and many other thousands of plants, still under private control, are centering their energies in this same direction.
"We have here in the United States vast resources in manufacturing and producing equipment, but they are unorganized and uneducated for the national service. Our observations of the European War have taught us that it is upon organized industry that we must base every plan of military defense. ”

“ But when the war is over our material productive power will be as great as ever, except for the small number of our ships that have been sunk or the small amount of damage done to us by enemy aircraft. Our railways and factories may be somewhat behindhand in upkeep, but that will soon be made good, and against that item on the debit side, we may set the great new organization for munition works, part of which, we may hope, will be available for peaceful production when the time for peace is ripe. ”

“ The British developed a vast production of munitions as the war went on, using great supplies of material from America, for which they paid high prices and on which great profits were made in America. At last America joined the war, with her enormous reserves and strength, and gave not only great stores of material but the lives of between 50,000 and 75,000 men. And so, altogether, America and the Allied Powers, giving their lives and substance as they could, saved civilization from imperialism. ”

“ At that difficult period we have to secure, if possible, that British industry shall be entirely unhampered in its endeavours to carry out the very puzzling operations involved by transferring its energies from war activities to peace production. ”

“ Our dependence upon France for artillery, aviation, and tanks was, of course, due to the fact that our industries had not been exclusively devoted to military production. All credit is due our own manufacturers for their efforts to meet our requirements, as at the time the armistice was signed we were able to look forward to the early supply of practically all our necessities from our own factories. ”

“ The war has shown us the extraordinary elasticity of productive power in modern times. In response to an urgent national need, material production has been stretched to a point that would have been incredible a few years ago. ”

“ Nor must it be forgotten that the great demand which has arisen for the supply of munitions, equipment, etc., for the armed forces of this country and of our Allies also, as well as the economic and financial necessity of keeping up the production of manufactured goods, involves the retention of a large number of men in various trades and manufactures, many of whom would otherwise be available for the Colors. ”

“ In Great Britain in particular the close industrial organisation required by the war has provided a revelation of hitherto unexplored and even unsuspected possibilities of production, proving “big” business to have been uncommonly bad business. ”

“ The high stage of world-industrial development in capitalistic production finds expression in the extraordinary technical development and destructiveness of the instruments of war, as in their practically uniform degree of perfection in all belligerent countries. ”

“ When the resources of a nation are mobilized for war, most of what it does is for a military end-whether it be rationing, or increased industrial or agricultural production, price control, or the host of other familiar activities. ”

“ It is also necessary by the fact that some firms have been developed through the exigencies of war, and not as a result of any great manufacturing ability, whereas in peace time the spur of competition would force the adoption of the most rapid methods of production. ”

“ Where the fate of the war rests Upon the farmers of this country, therefore, in large measure rests the fate of the war and the fate of the nations. May the nation not count upon them to omit no step that will increase the production of their land or that will bring about the most effectual coöperation in the sale and distribution of their products? ”

“ So far as production is concerned, the only change that war requires is greater speed and greater volume; the difference is one of degree and not at all of kind. It is only in the region of finance that war-time conditions work havoc with economic “laws” ”

“ All of the great wars in European history have been followed by periods of increased production and economic expansion. Experts are convinced that the World War will prove no exception to the world's previous experience. Wars have been the principal influence that have determined the course of commodities and prices. ”

“ The battlefield is the market for these new industries, the consumers of which are the soldiers. Various industries had to be enlisted and many new ones created for the supplies. In order to increase the production of these war commodities day by day, people of the warring countries and even those of the neutral states had to be content with the barest necessities of life and had to give up all former comforts and luxuries. ”

“ The lesson for us, from England's experience, is this: that every factory in the United States, now turning out luxuries, should be taken over by the government to turn out munitions; that every loom and lathe, forge and hammer, every mine and forest and shipyard should be dedicated to this one task—of winning this war for humanity and liberty. ”

“ The acceptance by the civilian population of sacrifices, caused by the diversion to war uses of the productive capacity of industry, will have a direct bearing upon the industrial capacity of that State. ”

“ Wars, as now waged, involve every human and material resource of a belligerent nation. Every factory and every man, woman, and child are affected. Every sinew of industry, of transportation, and of finance must be harnessed in the country's service. ”

“ Main headquarters authorizes you to use these credits to an unlimited extent for the purpose of destroying factories, workshops, camps, and the most important centers of military and civil supply belonging to the enemy. In addition to the incitement of labor troubles, measures must be taken for the damaging of engines and machinery plants, the destruction of vessels carrying war material to enemy countries, the burning of stocks of raw materials and finished goods, and the depriving of large industrial centers of electric power, fuel and food. ”

“ We need to know whether an industrial state of society, or the industrial stage of economic development, is especially prone to cause wars, as distinguished from more general political and economic interests. We need to know whether wars, in an industrial stage, do really serve either the interests of industry or countries as a whole. Finally, there is the question whether those who control industry and finance do actually create wars.
In the industrial and financial stages of economic development new conditions arise which certainly must be taken into account in any theory of war. ”

“ In preparation for or against that form of action the States of Europe are spending now such moments of uneasy leisure as they can snatch from the labours of factory and counting-house.
Never before has war received so much homage at the lips of men, and reigned with less disputed sway in their minds. It has harnessed science to its gun-carriages, it has enriched a few respectable manufacturers, scattered doles of food and raiment amongst a few thousand skilled workmen, devoured the first youth of whole generations, and reaped its harvest of countless corpses. ”

“ The cessation of hostilities will leave the world short of food, short of transport, short of raw materials. The machinery that has regulated these during war will have to be kept in action beyond the war. ”

“ The reader who has come to this point has before him the picture of the Nation's industry at war—the whole teeming effort in its main outlines, its myriad ramifications, its boundless activity, its ten thousand enterprises, its infinite toil, its hosts of workers, its wonders of scientific achievement, its attainments, even its failures—in short that humming complex of work, planning, ambition, disappointment, triumph, shortcomings, ability, and driving force which was a mighty people concentrated with all of its powers upon a single objective. ”

“ England, for instance, at the outbreak of the conflict could import vast quantities of munitions and supplies from other countries. England, therefore, had a fourth alternative, one denied to us because the struggle is now world-wide. All of the materials of war that we furnish must come from the current energy of our own people. We must ourselves produce these ships, munitions, food supplies, and stocks in the coming months. There is no one else to do it for us. ”